2 Blow stuck when I re-assemble by LF Thunderbird
Hi,
I'm having problems when I re-assemble my thunderbird after cleaning/gapping. The 2 blow reed gets stuck. Have you seen this before? I've never has this problem with my Crossovers. Anything different about lining up the comb and reedplates I should know about. Any advice would be greatly appreciated!
Thanks,
Marc
Hi Kinya, The 4 hole jammed on me so i pulled it apart, cleaned it with soapy water, moved the reed free, re-cleaned it again and reassembled it. It played well for a couple of days, except for me noticing a slight stickeyness in it,for like a second. But after the second day of playing it stuck again. This time I put a hair clip inside and pushed the reed lose again. Will this continue to happen? and is there anything I can do to restore this reed?. I am wondering if perhaps it is the food I am eating. I take Hemp seed oil to help with my tendonitis, but soapy water should have gotten ri of that. I brush regularly but often times I use salt to brush, could this purhaps corrode the brass reed plate, as I noticed that the reed plate was tarnished darkly in places that the soapy water wouldn't budge. Thanks for your time Karl
Hi Kinya,
It turns out that it was the comb. I usually clean/adjust a number of harps at once and somhow I ended mixing up my Thunderbird LF comb with a Crossover D comb. As I learned from a conversation with Jeff Wilson (wilsonmusic.ca), the combs are different on keys lower than D to accomidate the longer reeds.
Once I switched the combs back, everything worked fine!
Cheers,
Marc
Well done Marc! The 'ol wrong comb on the right reed plates trick!
Your Harpsmith, Kinya
Hi Marc, sorry to hear about your sick Thunderbird.
Often times when doing a general tune up on our harmonicas, we inadvertently:
The key to troubleshooting this issue is good lighting and magnification. On my bench top, I have enough illumination to do brain surgery by (320 footcandles). My magnification is a least 3X. With this type of working environment, a microscopic debris will look as large as a Buick Skylark! If you don't have access to bench lighting, then take your work outside--natural sunlight is wonderful (and healthy ;o)
I'm dying to find out what you discovered to be the culprit.
Your Harpsmith, Kinya